This invention relates to a high efficiency, flexible fuel engine and more particularly to an engine using reformer enhanced methanol operation.
There is an increasing need for improving the efficiency of internal combustion engines and providing alternative fuels to gasoline. Methanol is an attractive alternative fuel because it is readily made by gasification processes from a variety of feedstocks. These feedstocks include natural gas, municipal and industrial waste, agricultural and forestry wastes, biomass sources such as switchgrass and coal.
Methanol can also provide a means to substantially increase engine efficiency through exceptional knock suppression capability and exceptional ease of reformation into a hydrogen-rich gas which can be used to improve engine efficiency.
It is an object of the present invention to optimize the efficiency and flexibility of methanol use in spark ignition engines. Both engine operation with methanol from a single tank and two tank flexible fuel engines in which methanol is stored in one tank and gasoline or another fuel is stored in a second tank, are considered.